


Night Moves

by Safiyabat



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Canon Temporary Character Death, Dark Side of the Moon, Fallen Idols, M/M, Swan Song, The Curious Case of Dean Winchester, The Song Remains the Same, changing channels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-17
Updated: 2014-01-17
Packaged: 2018-01-08 23:54:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 7,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1138972
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Safiyabat/pseuds/Safiyabat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lucifer visits Sam in his dreams as the Apocalypse rages around them.  While he should be trying to convince Sam to say "Yes," Sam soon finds that the Adversary isn't exactly adversarial.  </p><p>Written for the FYSL Winter Fanwork Exchange with the prompt, "Classic Rock."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Carry That Weight

**Author's Note:**

> Chapter 1: coda to "Fallen Idols."
> 
> Supernatural and the characters from the show are not my property. I make no money from this or any other work of fan fiction.

“Boy, you gotta carry that weight,” the voices sang in his ears. “Carry that weight a long time.” Sam fought the urge to roll over yet again and forced himself to remain still. He wasn’t the biggest Beatles fan in the world but he’d put some of their stuff on his iPod while he’d been at Stanford in a fit of homesickness and never got around to taking it off. He’d known guys who insisted on eating meatloaf occasionally for the same reasons. They didn’t like it. No one liked meatloaf. No one. Every once in a while they’d choke that crap down though like it was the best stuff in the world and pretend like no one could see their eyes get all red. 

The Beatles were like that for Sam. 

Right now he wasn’t sure it was helping. On the one hand, the sounds of John, Paul, George and Ringo reminded him of long summer days when it had just been him and Dean while their father had been God (or whoever) knew where. Days when Dean had patiently worked to help him learn to use a knife, or to correct his aim no matter how much he’d hated to shoot. Days when Dean had thought there might be something worth saving in his mess of a little brother. On the other hand, their particular combination of voices and the rhythm really did nothing to keep him awake, and awake was key.

“Hello, Sam.”

Crap. He’d fallen asleep. He hadn’t meant to. “Lucifer,” he seethed. 

“Stop fighting it, Sam. Your brother’s already complaining about your fatigue and slowing you down, isn’t he? I’m doing you a favor keeping you asleep like this. It’s for your health.” The archangel stepped out of the shadows and gave a little half smile. “I can’t say that I agree with him on much but here, he’s right. You haven’t slept in days. You’re a danger to yourself and others.”

“Is that important? You said you’d just bring me back,” he retorted. 

“Yes, it’s important. I’m not interested in seeing you suffer, Sam.” He gestured and a blanket appeared around Sam’s shoulders. “You’ve obviously got a lot on your mind. Weight of the world and all that.” 

He didn’t even realize that his hands were drawing the blanket closer around himself. “You think that Satan appearing in my dreams might have something to do with that?”

“Yeah, that’s probably not helping. If you’d tell me where you were I swing by and pick you up and we could just dispense with all this.” 

“Huh. How about no?”

“I had to try.”

“I’m not going to give my consent. I’m just not. So stop trying.” He was not going to notice how the angel’s mouth looked as it quirked up at the corners. He just wasn’t.

Lucifer sighed. “I know you think you don’t want to. You will say yes eventually, Sam. It’s inevitable – we were made for each other, and I think you know it. But that’s not what this is about. You’re disturbed. I can feel it, all the way across our bond.” 

Sam inhaled sharply, glancing at the archangel. “That’s… that doesn’t make sense. Michael doesn’t feel anything through Dean.” 

“He doesn’t want to,” Lucifer scoffed. “The angels in Heaven don’t see their vessels as people, as individuals. My brother doesn’t even refer to yours as a person. He refers to him as his sword, doesn’t he? You don’t consider the feelings of your favorite gun, do you?”

In spite of himself, Sam snorted. “No.” He wasn’t going to betray Dean by spilling any more information about Dean’s relationship with Michael, though. “I suppose you’re different, though?” 

“I am. You’ll figure it out soon enough, though. Don’t just take my word for it – not that you would. You’ll see it with your eyes. How about this. I promise not to ask you to let me in for the whole night if you’ll relax, stop trying to wake up and let yourself actually get some sleep. Maybe we can actually have a conversation.”

Sam thought about it. “I can do that,” he agreed after a moment. “It’s not like I’ve got a choice, right?” 

“You’ve always got a choice, Sam. I’m all about free will.” He gestured toward a couch. “Have a seat. Make yourself comfortable. You’re tense.”

“Well, I did end the world a couple months ago.”

“I prefer to think of it as ushering in a new age, but I’m probably not about to change your mind. Not in one night anyway. You weren’t this tense the last time we spoke. Tell me what has you upset and I’ll flatten it.” 

Sam jumped. “No! Oh, God. No. No no no.” 

“What? I want to give you everything, Sam. If something hurt you it should suffer.” 

“He’s suffering enough because of me!” Sam shot back, running a hand through his hair.

“Ah. Your brother,” the Devil surmised. “I see. I assumed that when you reunited you would be happier.” 

“Me too – I mean, I am. I am so, incredibly lucky that Dean took me back.” One blond eyebrow arched upward. “It’s just…”

“Yes…” 

“It’s not right. We’re not right. I’m locked down so tight I’ve practically got to ask to go take a leak. I get why he’s doing it. He doesn’t trust me. And he shouldn’t. I’m the absolute worst – I was the absolute worst before we found out I’m your vessel.” He quirked half a grin. “No offense.”

“Surprisingly none taken.” 

Sam blinked. He wasn’t entirely sure why he was opening up to Lucifer, of all people. Hadn’t he made this same mistake with Ruby? “Anyway, it’s okay. It’s no more than I deserve. He wants to make sure that I don’t give in to you, which is why I really shouldn’t even remotely be here now.” 

“You know, Dean’s way isn’t the only way.”

“The last time I thought that I broke the world.” 

“Or you fixed it, Sam. Heaven isn’t exactly on the side of goodness and light, as you’ve already found out.” The archangel rose and came around behind Sam, putting his hands on the human’s shoulders and rubbing. The Winchester bit his lip. How had Lucifer learned to use his hands so well, so soothingly, after eternity in solitary confinement? “I won’t tell if you don’t, but no one can go along thinking their way is the One True Way. Not even Dean. He needs someone to question him, to make sure that he is on the right path. How else will he know he’s doing the right thing? And if he can’t accept that you’re your own person, you’ll have to blaze your own trail.” 

“That worked so well last time.” 

“Well, it did for me. But that’s kind of the point. If he’d been willing to listen to you, to put as much weight on your thoughts and opinions and experiences as he did on someone he met once, you wouldn’t be in this situation. You weren’t your father’s little soldier, Sam, and you’re not his.” Lucifer’s lips brushed his cheek. 

He woke up with a start, Dean backing away from him. “Jesus, Sam. I can’t remember the last time you slept so deeply.” He scowled. “Not that I can see how you can sleep after everything. Get up. It’s time to move on.”


	2. Dancing In The Dark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Coda to "The Curious Case of Dean Winchester."

Sam didn’t actually fight sleep after they finished with the poker-playing witch. He didn’t think he could. He’d been fighting it before the whole incident, and then of course playing cards with your brother and adoptive father’s lives on the line is kind of inherently exhausting. So he’d fought it as hard as he could until he got to the motel. 

Surprisingly he found himself with the single room for once. Maybe this was some kind of reward for having come through. Probably not, though. More likely than not Dean was leaping at the chance to spend a night in the company of anyone – anyone at all – besides the tainted, monstrous creature who had started the Apocalypse. The younger brother himself wasn’t sure how he should view the arrangement. It hurt that Dean would rather avoid him, especially after they’d been separated for so long and when Sam had been the one to save his sorry ass too. At the same time Sam could really live without the silence, the glaring and the marathon drinking. 

So while the solo motel room was lonely and frankly kind of seedy Sam decided he could view it with equanimity. He lay out his salt lines and put up his warding and did some calisthenics and got some research in before his eyes absolutely positively and thoroughly mutinied on him. He got into the bed and gave in to sleep. It wasn’t as though he was worried that his nightmares would wake his bunkmate.

Not that his dreams were always nightmares, and it was pretty clear that tonight was going to be one of the non-monster variety. He found himself walking into a game room, complete with poker table. Bruce Springsteen was blaring in the background. “Can’t start a fire,” he growled. “Can’t start a fire without a spark.” “Why do I suspect that playing poker with you is a worse idea than playing with the stupid witch?” he asked when Lucifer cracked a grin at him.

The archangel snorted. “I had to try. Although after what you did today I wouldn’t be surprised if you could beat me.” The cards and chips disappeared, replaced with beers. “That was some pretty impressive work that you did today, Sam.” 

Sam side-eyed his companion. “Uh… thanks.”

“You’re not used to getting thanked.” 

“Well…”

“Your brother is a pig, Sam. I know you don’t like to hear it, but he is.” He held up one hand. “I won’t do anything against him, I promise. But he isn’t taking care of you the way he’s supposed to and it’s making me angry.” 

“Look, Lucifer, he’s… he’s doing what he needs to do. And today he was kind of occupied… you know, being old.”

Against all probability the Devil laughed. “I would have loved to have seen him as an old man, huffing and puffing on the stairs.”

“It was kind of sad, you know?” the human replied after a sip from his beer. “I mean, it won’t happen for real. The world’s going to end bloody and he won’t have a chance to grow old.” 

“He will if you say yes to me and we win. He’ll be safe, as long as he stays out of my way. You have my word.” He wrinkled his nose. “The witch put some kind of curse on you, didn’t he?” He reached over and put an icy hand on Sam’s bare arm. Sam inhaled sharply at the contact. “Someone doesn’t get a lot of hugs,” Lucifer commented.

The hunter forced himself to calm down. It was his own dream, after all. He could not even remotely be attracted to the Devil. Well, maybe he could. He was the most tainted creature on the planet, lower even than a demon. “We’re not exactly a demonstrative family,” he pointed out. 

There was a brief flash of light and Sam found himself feeling physically better, at least. “That should clear up any lingering effects from the witch’s curse,” the angel informed him.

“You’re… still touching me,” Sam pointed out. 

“True.” Blue eyes, pale and intense, met his. “Is it unpleasant?” 

“Y… no.” He forced himself to breathe normally.

“Was it so very hard to admit?” 

“Yes.” He chuckled a little. “You knew the answer to that.”

Lucifer had to chuckle a little too. He left his hand on Sam’s arm even as he got up and walked around the table to stand in front of his vessel. “You want it to be unpleasant,” he observed. “You want to hate me. You want to be disgusted by me.”

“Well, yeah.” Sam wasn’t usually prone to feeling great about himself but he would always be guilty of a certain amount of pride in the way that his voice remained calm and confident when he replied. “I mean, you’re the leader of one of the factions I’m supposed to be fighting. And, you know, you’re the devil. So there’s that.” 

“But you’re not repulsed.”

“No,” he admitted, and maybe he had to look away a little bit here. “But then again, I’ve never been the smartest guy when it comes to that kind of thing.” 

Lucifer smiled again. “Yes, well. No one has a lot of control over attraction, Sam. I’m going to kiss you.”

I shouldn’t allow this, Sam thought as the blond leaned down and in. It’s disloyal, it’s wrong. When Lucifer’s lips touched his his objections stilled. 

The kiss was gentle, almost chaste. “Was that so bad?” Lucifer inquired softly, eyes locked on Sam’s.

“Morally or subjectively?” Sam retorted. He didn’t tear his eyes away. Shouldn’t he have been afraid or something? 

“Is it the vessel? Because I can make Nick here look like anything else.”

Sam reached out without even thinking about it and put his hands on Lucifer’s hips. “No!” he insisted. “No. It’s not the vessel. It’s that whole making-out-with-the-enemy thing.” 

“Did it feel good?” 

“Yeah.” He chuckled. “Of course it did.”

“Then think of it as a reward for your incredible feat of chicanery today, Sam.” Lucifer grinned. His next kiss was less chaste.

The alarm clock woke Sam up. Dean must have set it when they checked in. The fact that “Dancing In The Dark” was the song playing on the radio when the alarm when off was purely coincidental.


	3. Breaking the Law

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Coda to "Changing Channels"

Sam was a microcosm of the Apocalypse. Three sensations warred within him. There was fatigue – well, more like a bone-deep exhaustion, really. Maybe that side represented Heaven, because that side was a massive force that Sam could simply not fight. And then there was the pain. Neither of them had exactly gotten off easy in TV Land but he (and his nether regions) had been singled out for special attention. Everything hurt. Getting turned into a car would do that to you. (And of course it was absolutely necessary to go messing around in the trunk, Dean.) The pain probably represented the hunting side of the equation, the Winchester side, the part where the Winchesters weren’t going to play for either Heaven or Hell but were going to get beat to hell – beat to – well, just beat up by both sides because they were human or a reasonable facsimile thereof and the other sides weren’t. 

Then there was the shame. The Trickster had spent a lot of extra time and attention on his genitalia. There was the stupid Herpexia commercial – that one hadn’t really harmed him but it was just… mean-spirited. Like he had been led to start the Apocalypse because he couldn’t keep it in his pants. Seriously? Other stunts, like the stupid Nutcracker game show, hadn’t been so free from physical pain. And then there had been the whole Sam-as-Impala thing, with Dean rummaging around in the trunk… 

He decided to go for the shower before he went for the painkillers or the knockout drugs or the bed. Usually he deferred to Dean on the shower and he probably should have done so here – Dean had suffered too. He’d been shot after all and it was important to remember to defer to Dean. Dean hadn’t asked for any of this, Dean didn’t deserve it. (Not the way Sam did.) Of course, Dean hadn’t had his brother rummaging around in his backside or a runaway archangel perving on his private parts so Sam decided to just take his shower, damn it. Not all the scrubbing in the world could make him feel clean, but that was nothing new. His veins had run with filth for as long as he could remember, why would now be any different? At least the hot water helped a little with some of the muscle aches.

Dean of course was very sympathetic when Sam got out. “Nice of you to leave me some hot water, bitch,” he snarled. He’d already made some generous inroads into a bottle of Jack. 

“Did you bring the med kit in, Dean?” he asked, trying to sound suitably submissive instead of pissed off. “I could use some painkillers.” 

“We’re running low,” the senior Winchester retorted. “Suck it up.” He gestured at the bottle. “Take some of this if you need help getting to sleep.” Sam rolled his eyes and folded his lips shut before limping over and filling one of the paper cups to the brim with whiskey. He chugged it down, impressing Dean, before gingerly getting into the bed and pulling the covers up. 

Sleep found him immediately, as though it had been waiting for him. He guessed it had been – they’d been in TV Land for days or so he’d heard. Lucifer was there too. The air in the dream room just crackled with electricity. “Where is he?” the archangel demanded. Nothing of the gentle Lucifer Sam had kissed before remained now; all that remained here was wrath. “Where is this Trickster?” 

“Lucifer, it doesn’t matter. He’s probably long gone,” he told him wearily. “We couldn’t find him if we wanted to.”

“I’ll kill him. I will boil his blood in his body, and then freeze it because I can. I will shatter every bone in his pathetic skeleton. I will make him regret the day that he ever laid eyes on Sam Winchester!” the blond raged. 

“Lucifer, stop,” he urged. “It doesn’t matter. It’s over.”

“It does matter. It matters to me. I couldn’t find you, I couldn’t even feel you!” He gestured. “Look at you. Your physical injuries shouldn’t even be a problem here and you still can’t even move without pain.” 

He shrugged. “Lucifer, I don’t want you to hurt him.”

“Why not?” 

“Because it would hurt you too.” 

“Why would you even remotely say that?” The archangel got into his face. “Anyone who hurts you should pay for their crime, Sam. They should answer to me and they should answer to me with finality.” 

“What I did has already hurt so many people, I don’t want more people to get hurt because of me.” He reached up and stroked the blond’s stubbled cheek gently, trying to ground him. “Plus… he’s your brother. The Trickster was a runaway angel.” That much was safe, right?

“An angel did this to you?” Lucifer seethed.

“Yeah, well, most angels are kind of dicks. Considering that they locked you in solitary at the beginning of time, I didn’t think I had to tell you that.” He gave soft smile to the being. It was kind of nice, knowing that Lucifer was so willing to act for him. That someone could become so enraged on his behalf. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to fight you.” 

“I know you don’t.” Some of the wind went out of Lucifer’s sails now. “You can barely stand up. Here.” He took Sam into his arms and guided him to a couch that probably hadn’t been there a second ago. “I want to help you, Sam.”

He laughed. “You want to help me stop the Apocalypse?” 

“It can’t be stopped. If I could, I probably would. But Michael wouldn’t listen to me then, he’s certainly not going to listen to me now. I would like to help you feel better now. Let me help you with your bruises.”

“You know I can’t tell you where I am,” Sam objected.

“Sam, I’m an archangel. I don’t need to be near your physical body to help you with that.” He found a bruise on Sam’s wrist. “Like so.” He bent down and touched his mouth to the blemish. Sam only saw the briefest of flickers of light, and his angel’s lips felt impossibly cold on his skin. Lucifer’s grace was not like Castiel’s grace, not that he’d felt much of Castiel’s healing touch either. There was an oddly electric jolt that went with it, not enough to be painful, just enough to barely tingle. He caught his breath. Lucifer looked up at him through his lashes and Sam felt a blush overtake his cheeks. “You found that pleasant, Sam?” 

“Maybe,” he confessed. 

“Really?” He moved up to the next bruise, a little farther up the arm. The previous bruise had completely disappeared. Sam let out a little sigh that he couldn’t quite hold back. “That’s more than a maybe face, Sam.”

“Okay. It’s definitely pleasant.”

“Mmm. I had planned to go do some righteous smiting. But I think I might be able to put my time to more productive use instead. And of course that works out well for you, doesn’t it?”

He moved over to the other arm now. “Mmm- oooh? How d you figure?”

“Well, if I’m here, healing you up and making you make all those nice little sounds then I’m not out hunting down the little angel who did all this to you.” 

“Lucifer, I’m not using you to get healed up. And I’m not whoring myself out to distract you.” He sat up a little straighter. 

The archangel sighed. “Sam, it’s not a sin to feel good. I know a little something about sin, okay? I am the Devil. I want to make you feel good, because you feel bad and because I can make you feel better.” He put a hand on Sam’s neck where the Impala had encountered a pothole during the drive and kicked up a large rock. Even just using his hands, Lucifer’s healing power had an erotic edge to it. “And does it count as distracting me if it was my idea?” Sam didn’t have an answer for that. “Right. May I continue healing up those minor injuries?”

Sam swallowed. This was every kind of inappropriate that there was. “Please.”

Lucifer grinned crookedly. Sam found that his tee shirt had suddenly disappeared, revealing the host of bruises underneath. “It is a very good thing,” the blond stated, leaning down to attach his mouth to one of the marks, “that your brother has consumed so much whiskey that a ten piece brass band playing next to his head wouldn’t be able to wake him.” 

Anywhere Sam ached Lucifer’s mouth followed, dispensing minute amounts of grace to heal where the Trickster’s elaborate alternate reality had harmed. Despite what Dean not-so-privately suspected about Sam’s sex life when Dean hadn’t been around to “supervise” it hadn’t been all vanilla and he certainly wasn’t unfamiliar with the feeling of someone else’s stubble against his skin. And this was so far from his first time doing things with someone who wasn’t human that it wasn’t even funny. 

What was different about this was that Lucifer was actually doing this entirely for Sam. Sam’s usual preferences involved reciprocity. He liked to be the one causing the little moans and sighs at least as often as he liked being on the receiving end. Right now if he even tried to move, to show his appreciation for the incredible way Lucifer was making him feel, Lucifer simply held him down. Little by little, kiss by kiss the hurt faded away. Or maybe Sam just didn’t notice it anymore, too turned on to care about little things like pain. 

Lucifer had not been joking about Dean. Sam slept far later than he normally would have and still woke up before his brother. He did wake up in desperate need of another shower, though. Fortunately the shower was free, Dean being in a drunken stupor and all. The stupor had lifted by the time Sam got out of the shower, though. “I told you you didn’t need painkillers, bitch,” Dean sneered, stuffing clothes into his duffel and giving him a bloodshot stink eye.


	4. Screaming for Vengeance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Coda to "The Song Remains The Same"

Sam didn’t sleep for a while after their trip down memory lane. He tried, but Dean was in an even worse mood than usual and there was nothing – nothing – that he could do to make it better. He tried. He tried harder than maybe he should have, considering that he had just been stabbed in the chest with a lead pipe. But really, would that have been the worst fate? Sure, getting stabbed in the chest with a lead pipe had hurt. It had been a crappy way to go to be honest, and Sam had a few means of comparison already. But if Anna had been allowed to scatter his atoms across the universe wouldn’t that have stopped the Apocalypse? 

But he’d come back. Of course he had. Lucky him. He’d come back to a sullen, angry brother and a comatose falling angel and a sullen, angry adoptive father and the only person who actually gave a rat’s ass about him being the guy who wanted to wear him like a suit. Forgive him if he wasn’t exactly enthusiastic about opening his eyes again. 

That was the wrong way to think. Yes, Lucifer did want to use him as a vessel. That didn’t mean that Lucifer didn’t care for him. He did. Well, he presumably did. He made Sam feel like he did anyway. Maybe that was the important thing. Maybe it was real and maybe it wasn’t but it certainly was the only thing keeping Sam upright during this fight a lot of the time. And truth be told, if it weren’t for the whole end-of-days thing, the whole vessel thing didn’t seem like such a bad thing to Sam. He’d been drawn to Lucifer from the moment the crypt opened and he knew it. What would he really be giving up? Dean was only with him now to keep tabs on him, to keep him from screwing the world up further. 

He did fall asleep after a while – again, he couldn’t help it. He wasn’t sure what he’d find when he got there, of course. Just because Lucifer came to him in his dreams didn’t mean that all of his dreams were Satanic. He felt perfectly justified in expecting to see a replay of Anna throwing their mother across the room, for example. Or of Uriel manhandling the younger, gentler version of their father. Or maybe his subconscious would have some fun and introduce Young John to the John Winchester he knew, knock him around a few times too.

“You know you’re probably pretty screwed up when you see me in your dreams and say, ‘Oh, thank God it’s Satan,” Lucifer greeted when he found himself in the dream room. His eyes were cold again. For whatever reason the room had a jukebox, and the jukebox was blaring Judas Priest. 

“You’re angry,” Sam noticed, leaning against the wall.

“Well, you died, Sam,” the angel pointed out, rising from the couch. “Yes, I’m angry.”

“Was it Michael who brought me back?” 

“Why would he do a foolish thing like that? He’s not given to sentiment.”

Sam huffed. “He told Dean that he would.”

“He lied. He does that.”

“I guess. Look. We had to go back. She was going to kill our mother.” 

“She killed you instead!”

“Was that really such a bad thing?” 

The blond got right up into his personal space. “Yes, Sam. Yes it was.” He looked away. “I grieved, you know.”

“I wasn’t actually dead all that long.”

Lucifer opened his mouth to reply angrily and then stopped and laughed, shaking his head. “Do you have any idea how absurd you sound? How absurd it is that we can sit here and have an argument about how it doesn’t matter that you died because you weren’t dead for all that long?” His expression turned bitter. “Michael told me, you know.” 

“Told you what? That I wore some ugly-ass bell bottoms in 1978?”

“That you bought into her idea. That you tried to convince your mother not to conceive you.” He shook his head. “Do you have any idea how I felt when I heard that, Sam?”

He sighed and reached out to put his hands on Lucifer’s shoulders. “Lucifer, I’m sorry that hurt you. I don’t want to hurt you. I don’t. But you know I’m fighting you out there, in the waking world. If it weren’t for the whole Apocalypse I wouldn’t but I have to. I can’t just roll over and let humanity die because I screwed up, however I feel about you.”

“Sam.” The angel brushed his cheek gently. “You couldn’t have known.” 

“It doesn’t change the fact that I screwed up. I broke Dean’s heart. He went to Hell for me and I repaid him by breaking the world.” 

“He didn’t ask Michael to heal you, you know.” The blond sat down on the couch, pulled him down to a seat beside him. “He didn’t ask him to resurrect you. He asked Michael to ‘fix’ you, like you were a broken car.” 

Sam shrugged. “I’m sure. I hurt him, Lucifer. He only keeps me around to keep me from becoming worse than I am.” 

“He sided with you on not letting you be born, didn’t he?”

“I was right.”

“No!” Lucifer grabbed his shoulders and gave a little shake. “Sam, no.”

“All I do is hurt the ones I love. I hurt Dean, I got Bobby hurt and you know that I’ll eventually hurt you too.”

“You want to?” 

“No. But we’re at war. With each other.”

“Valid.” They sat in silence for a moment. 

Sam bit his lip. “Lucifer?”

“Yes, Sam?”

“I’d really like to kiss you. If that’s okay. I’m sorry that I scared you. I’m sorry that I sought a solution to the Apocalypse that would have resulted in us never being together. It’s not because I don’t care for you.” “It’s because we have to.” 

He nodded. “I thought you wanted to kiss me.” 

Sam huffed, then he leaned over and caught the angel’s face in his hands. Lucifer’s kisses were measured, controlled. He was affectionate and even loving. He seemed to be surprised by the heat that Sam put into his kiss, opening his eyes wide for a moment before grabbing Sam tighter and responding. The hunter tugged at the angel’s jacket and shirts, only adding his own to the pile once Lucifer sat bare-chested before him. “Is this okay?” he asked. Maybe he was being presumptuous. The guy was a multidimensional wavelength of celestial intent, not a human male. He’d never been human. Maybe he didn’t actually have desires the way a mortal creature did. 

Lucifer smirked. “I think it’s more than okay, Sam. If it’s what you want.” 

“I want to make you feel good, Lucifer,” he told him, meeting his eyes. “While I still can. I can’t give you what I know you want most and I don’t actually own anything else. But… it’s something that I know makes me feel good, at least for a while, and I wanted to offer it to you. If you wanted it.”

In response Lucifer waved a hand both men were naked now, and that was just a very strange sensation – to go from half clad to entirely unclad in the blink of an eye. “You’ll tell me if you’re uncomfortable with something, right?” Sam asked him, maintaining eye contact. The angel nodded. 

It became readily apparent that while Lucifer had been very much aware of what he was doing when he had been focusing on Sam’s body when it came to the one he currently inhabited he was a novice. He knew what to do to please Sam; when it came to someone pleasing him the sensations seemed to startle him as much as an air horn in a library. He tried to stifle his gasps and moans at first and Sam pulled back. “You don’t enjoy that?” he asked.

“Please don’t stop,” Lucifer spat out. 

“I only know that you’re enjoying it if you respond,” he told his partner with a smile and a kiss. Sam Winchester knew he wasn’t good for much, but one thing he’d always done well was get people off. 

Later, Lucifer kissed him deeply. “I know that we’re at war here, Sam,” he intoned in his velvet-soft voice, “but maybe we could keep the time-travelling suicide attempts to a minimum?” 

“Will you let me love you like this if I only fight in my usual time and place?” 

“Any time you want to, Sam.”

“Then we have a deal.”


	5. For What It's Worth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Coda to "Dark Side of the Moon"

Sam knew how this was going to go down as soon as he heard the motel room door come crashing in. He’d known taking Dean up on his encouragement to “have a drink with me, Sammy,” had been a bad idea. He’d done it anyway, because it might be nice to pretend that they were real brothers again. Of course had they talked about anything, resolved anything? No. They’d guzzled can after can of cheap beer in silence. Dean had glared at him. Sam had stared at the floor, because how do you admit to the brother that already thinks you burn everything you touch that you’re falling in love with the archangel who wants to wear you? So now here he was waking up with a hangover, a full bladder and two men pushing their way into the motel room with guns. They wore ski masks. Maybe robbery was a motive. And maybe, just maybe, peace in the Holy Land was achievable.

He raised his hands to the ceiling. “Look, he’s got nothing to do with anything, I’m the one you want,” he told them in as quiet a voice as he could. Hopefully Dean would sleep through the whole thing and then maybe just… what, walk away? 

One of the invaders reached under Dean’s pillow and pulled out the gun he kept there while the other kept his shotgun trained on Dean. It was effective. Even hung over Sam could probably take him, but with the gun aimed at his brother like that there was no way he could afford to risk it. Dean finally stirred when he heard the voice ask him if he was looking for the damn gun. Seriously, Dean? Was he still that drunk or had he gotten that apathetic? Dean glanced over at him. “Mornin’” he greeted. 

“Shut up!” the other killer barked. “Hands where I can see ‘em!”

“Wait a minute,” Dean drawled. “Is that you, Roy?” He gave a typical cocky grin, and of course Dean knew them. Of course he freaking knew them, because he was Dad’s golden child and was allowed to know people. Sam was the unclean one, hidden in the dark where no one could see him. “It is, isn’t it? Which makes you Walt,” he surmised, looking to the other one. “Hiya, Walt.” 

“Don’t matter,” the first said, pulling off the ski mask. “You think you can flip the switch on the Apocalypse and just walk away, Sam?”

Got it in one, he thought, and wondered if they’d let him use the bathroom before killing him. “Who told you that?” he asked, hoping to buy some time. Buy some time for what he didn’t know.

“We ain’t the only hunters after you,” the second told him. He cocked the shotgun. 

Sam couldn’t help but flinch. He hadn’t died by shotgun blast yet. “Wait, I can explain!” he said. “Just hear me out, please.” 

Roy and Walt exchanged glances. “See you in the next life.” Then two blasts rang out. He felt a strange heat in his chest, and then nothing. 

The next thing he knew he was in Hell. It wasn’t what he expected. He could hear the groans of souls elsewhere, but this part was actually not awful. It didn’t smell great – a lot like sulfur, actually – but otherwise it just kind of looked like a grotto in a cave. Meg stood there, with Lucifer beside her. She smiled beatifically at him. Lucifer kept composed. “Meg, be a dear and get started on what I just told you about, would you?” 

“Of course, Lord,” she replied, bowing deeply to her master. “See ya, Sammy. Tough break.” She reached up to pat him on the shoulder companionably on her way out. 

“Hello, Sam,” Lucifer greeted. “We’re alone here. No spies.” 

He grinned. “It’s really you. Not a dream this time.”

“Yes. Really me. In the flesh, as it were.” He stepped out of the shadows to reveal the burns to his vessel’s face. “I’m afraid Nick here isn’t doing too well. It turns out he’s not really suited to housing an archangel.”

“Can he… can he feel it?” Sam asked.

“I’m insulating him as best I can. And while I look like him when I come to you in your dreams, that’s just how your brain perceives me because it can’t handle an angelic true form. So it’s actually me you’re messing around with, not Nick’s body.” 

“Oh.” He wasn’t quite sure how to respond to that. “That’s good. I mean, in a dream and everything I hadn’t been too worried? But maybe I should have been?”

“Look at you. Freshly dead again and you’re all concerned about Nick. Listen, I don’t have much time. You’re going to Heaven, Sam.”

“I already went to Hell, Lucifer.”

“Yeah. I know. It’s a set-up. Don’t fall for it. Zachariah and company have something planned, I can’t resurrect you until those mud-monkeys get away from your bodies or I’ll just have to do it all over again. I just… I don’t want you to be too broken up about what you see in Heaven, okay? Remember, your place is with me.” 

A bright, white light filled the cave, and the next thing Sam knew he was sitting at a Thanksgiving dinner he remembered from fifteen years in the past.

* 

Later, much later, they found a different motel room and they went to bed. Dean once again drank himself to sleep. Who cared if he got killed in the night? It wasn’t like he was going to stay dead. And Sam stayed sober, both because he couldn’t handle drinking with Dean right now and because Dean was neither sharing nor speaking to him. (“Worthless.”) He got cleaned up. He got into his bed. He sat in his bed. He took some sleeping pills. Lucifer was there as soon as he closed his eyes. “Sam, I’m so sorry.”

“You did warn me.”

“I couldn’t warn Dean.” 

“He wouldn’t have listened to you anyway.”

“I know.” He sighed and took the hunter into his arms. “I wish there were some other way of doing this, Sam.” 

“I know. Me too.” He let his angel hold him, his essence wrapped around him like a feathery blanket. “Was it always like that?” 

“Not while our father was around. Not while he was in charge. Michael became a martinet, you know? It became all about orders and strict adherence and he’d make up a new rule every day. No deviation from the plan, not ever.” One corner of his mouth quirked up. “I think that’s something you might be familiar with.”

“But with everyone in their little solitary confinement?” “Oh. Yeah, I was gone before that. A long time before that, actually. Under my Father Heaven was beautiful, and it was free. The choirs of angels were actually choirs. We sang my Father’s praises day and night. That’s not made up, you know. There was music without ceasing.” 

“What was it like?” 

“I don’t think the human mind can really comprehend it. I don’t want to belittle you, but your ears simply can’t make out the subtleties of a five thousand part harmony. It’s not physically possible even for your most gifted individuals. When we’re one someday you’ll see, you’ll understand.” 

“Lucifer –“

“You’ll understand, Sam, because it’s a two-way street. As much as it can be, anyway. We’ll belong to each other. We’ll be each other. You’ll know what it was like because you’ll see it, hear it, FEEL it.” 

Sam stopped. “You know nothing good will come from that,” he said instead. “It won’t go anywhere good. For either of us.” His angel stroked his hair for several minutes. “I’ve lost him,” he said then. 

“You were supposed to, Sam. That was the design.” He sighed. “We’re not just fighting each other, you know. We’re both fighting Zachariah and Michael too.”

“What’s the point in fighting? Without Dean –“

“You already know what I think about Dean. But since you asked, the point is humanity. Prove me wrong, Sam. Prove Dean wrong.” He sighed. “He’s going to do something monumentally stupid soon. You’re going to have to take steps.” 

Sam sighed. “I shouldn’t get into that with you.”

“Better you than me, Sam.” 

He looked the blue-eyed man in the eye for a moment. “It depends on who you ask. I think he has more respect for you right now.” 

“Hey. None of that was your fault.” 

“They were still my memories. And none of them included him.”

“How many of his included you?” Sam got quiet. None of Dean’s memories, at least the ones he’d been privy to, had included Sam. “Right. You are worth every bit as much as Dean is.” He leaned in and kissed Sam. “The time is getting close, Sam. Let’s try to enjoy what’s left of it.” 

When Dean took off, Sam was prepared. He had a plan in place, thanks to the advance warning.


	6. One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Addendum to "Swan Song"

Sam would have given a lot for none of this to be happening. He would have given a lot to be sober for this, to not have four gallons of demon blood pumping through his veins. He would have given a lot for his brain to not be pushing out at every swirling pit of black smoke encased in human flesh that surrounded his target. Maybe he could have held back the raw power within him that reached out and just snuffed out the consciousness, the life within them. He’d never know, because he didn’t and it didn’t even hurt. He would have given anything to not be seething with the wrong kind of heat as he stood before Lucifer now, just wishing that the ice that collected around the angel would cool him down. He would have given anything to not have to meet those pale blue eyes as an adversary – although that was Lucifer’s whole thing, wasn’t it? He was the Adversary, after all.

Most of all, he would have given anything at all for Dean not to be a witness to this. Oh, he knew that Dean thought he was here to be supportive. He knew Dean believed he was helping, that it was the two of them against the world.

“Yes,” Sam insisted, unable to keep still.

Lucifer, of course, didn’t have that problem. He closed his eyes and stepped forward, bringing his lips to Sam’s as light began to fill the room. Sam had time for a brief moment of shock and even humor – that was how they were going to do this? In front of Dean, even? – before the light overtook him and time just stopped.

It wasn’t just time that stopped. Everything stopped. “What’s happening?” he asked.

“Relax, Sam. I’m making it last.” 

He couldn’t see Lucifer, or rather he couldn’t see Nick. What Sam could see was light – light everywhere. “Let me give you this.”

“But… you already know what I’m planning.”

“I knew already. And yes – all access pass, Sam. You’re still my Sam.”

“You know I have to fight you.”

“Yes.” Was there a twinge of sadness to the sound? “Just as I know that if I can convince Michael to walk off the field you’ll stop fighting me and we can be just like this forever.”

“Do you promise?” 

“I do.” 

The light that surrounded him pressed on him gently, from all sides. Jimmy had described being possessed by an angel as like being chained to a comet, and Castiel wasn’t even close to being an archangel. There was nothing so unpleasant, so violent about Lucifer. The Morningstar suffused him, pressed into him so slowly that he almost didn’t realize he was being filled until he actually felt full. He forced his body to relax and allow it. He had said yes, after all, and there was nothing about this that didn’t feel good. 

Every synapse, every nerve ending felt alive, felt both aflame and quenched at the same time. There was nothing in his human experience that could have possibly prepared him for this. When people said they’d found their soulmate, or referred to someone as “their other half” they were using terms that they could only half understand at best. The essence of Lucifer patched every jagged hole in Sam’s psyche, wove itself into the marrow of his very bones. If he could take every orgasm he’d ever experienced – with men, with women, with humans, with monsters, even with Lucifer himself – and combine them, then multiply by factors incalculable by human brains, it would still not compare to the sensation of having the real Lucifer inside him. Knowing that Lucifer felt it too – feeling it as Lucifer felt it – only increased the ecstasy. “I wanted you to have this,” his lover told him. “No matter what comes next, I wanted you to have this.”


End file.
